“They Want to Kill Me on Friday?” - Great-Grandmother Euthanized in Canada
Diagnosed with terminal Stage IV stomach cancer, Stegemann had wanted to die naturally. But while her granddaughter and longtime legal representative, Brigitte Kranendonk, was away on vacation, medical personnel discussed MAiD with Stegemann.
She was subsequently deemed capable of choosing MAiD despite allegedly being unable to answer basic questions about her own family. Canadian Catholic News reported that Kranendonk said her grandmother had originally rejected MAiD but was persuaded to request it during her absence.
When Kranendonk returned and asked her grandmother whether she really wanted to die, Stegemann’s reaction was heartbreaking. “I’m supposed to die on Friday? They want to kill me on Friday?”, she reportedly asked through tears.
Her family says she later repeatedly expressed regret, telling them she had made a mistake.
On the morning she was scheduled to die, Stegemann sat outside with her family, eating strawberry ice cream - her favourite - and waiting for her preacher. These would be among her final moments with the people who loved her.
When the physician arrived, Stegemann reportedly sat silently, her hands folded in prayer.
Her family says they had been assured that final verbal consent would be obtained before the lethal medication was administered. According to their account, that final “yes” never came. The medication was administered anyway.
Brigitte Stegemann died that day.
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